Mobile

Nintendo will be releasing its first mobile game this year. We don’t know what exactly is planned, but don’t expect to hear about anything at E3 2015 next month.

Nintendo president Satoru Iwata, speaking at the company’s latest financial briefing, confirmed that there are no plans to discuss smartphone games. That’s because they realize the event is for “dedicated gaming systems”.

Right now, the game business is undergoing significant change. The spread of the Internet and social media has dramatically changed the lifestyles of people all over the world, and Nintendo is adjusting its strategic endeavors in line with the new market dynamics.

For one thing, in order to maximize the value of Nintendo IP, we are working to leverage opportunities that go beyond a traditional focus on dedicated video game systems. As you know, amiibo is one such effort. Also, we made the announcement that we will take advantage of smart devices. As smart devices are increasing in significance as the dominant window through which consumers connect with one another and with society, it is natural for us to leverage smart devices to communicate directly with our consumers.

In addition, to facilitate the ability for consumers to be closely and continuously connected with Nintendo IP, Nintendo will also deploy Nintendo IP on games for smart devices.

Regarding this subject, we announced our business alliance with DeNA on March 17. Each of our companies offers unique strengths, and we are confident that when combined, the synergies will enable us to compete strongly in the smart device space.

We will start the service for the first game application by the end of this calendar year. Internally at Nintendo, we have executed several organizational and personnel changes in order to properly operate the smart device business, and we will make further changes before the first release.

As we confirmed on March 17, all of our IP can be considered for a smart device game. On the other hand, since the game business on smart devices is already severely competitive, even with highly popular IP, the odds of success are quite low if consumers cannot appreciate the quality of a game. Also, if we were simply to port software that already has a track record on a dedicated game system, it would not match the play styles of smart devices, and the appropriate business models are different between the two, so we would not anticipate a great result. If we did not aim to achieve a significant result, it would be meaningless for us to do it at all. Accordingly, we are going to carefully select appropriate IP and titles for our smart device deployment.

Regarding the number of the titles, you may want to know that we will release approximately five titles by the end of the next fiscal year, which is the end of March 2017. You may think it is a small number, but when we aim to make each title a hit, and because we want to thoroughly operate every one of them for a significant amount of time after their releases, this is not a small number at all and should demonstrate our serious commitment to the smart device business.

We will strive to expand this business into global markets at a steady pace so that eventually we will entertain hundreds of millions of people all around the world. We are aiming to make this one of the pillars of Nintendo’s revenue structure.

According to Iwata, Nintendo wants to have five mobile games out by March 2017. This may seem like a small number, but the Big N wants them to become hits. Additionally, given the business, Nintendo doesn’t believe their plans are half-hearted at all.

It won’t be too long before we see Nintendo’s first, true effort for smart devices. The goal is to bring out the first mobile title this year.

Reuters recently had the opportunity to speak with DeNA chief executive Isao Moriyasu. During the interview, Moriyasu stated that the company hopes to bring in over 3 billion yen ($25.02 million) a month from its new mobile partnership with Nintendo.

He said:

“We want to create games that will be played by hundreds of millions of people. We want to create multiple hit games rather than aiming to succeed with just one powerful IP element. We haven’t talked to Nintendo about targets, but at DeNA, our best-selling game brought in 3 billion yen a month, and we want to surpass that.”

There’s another interesting portion from Reuters’ report as well. The site claims – based on what analysts have said – that “Nintendo will likely earn around 70 percent” from its partnership with DeNA.

Nintendo held a presentation with DeNA last week to announce a partnership between the two companies. Towards the end, Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata and DeNA president Isao Moriyasu fielded questions from attendees. The entire Q&A is now live, and you can find it right here.

I won’t be breaking down the Q&A into various excerpts per usual, as we covered it quite a bit last week (in both video and summary form). There also isn’t a whole lot of information that we haven’t already covered. Still, it might be worth a read for some of you!

Nintendo and DeNA held a presentation earlier this week to announce a big partnership between the two companies, as the Big N is finally set to make a big splash in the mobile space with original games for smart devices. Towards the end of the event, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata and DeNA CEO Isao Moriyasu fielded some questions from those in attendance.

Here’s a brief summary as to what was discussed:

– Iwata says “that each company will have to rely on their good strengths”
– The two discussed how Nintendo will make the games and DeNA will handle the back end
– Moriyasu added that Nintendo will make the games and DeNA will support them
– He also said that the role each company plays will vary by game depending on needs
– Iwata on why Nintendo decided to partner with DeNA: “The world of business is always changing. Therefore, Nintendo is always adjusting.”
– Moriyasu is positive that the mobile game business is only getting larger and larger
– He wondered how he could make business even bigger, and he believes partnering with Nintendo will do just that
– Iwata said that there is no relationship between DeNA and the Nintendo NX
– Again, Nintendo is not going to give up making games for dedicated Nintendo platforms
– Iwata said he is thinking about cross platform interaction between smart phones and dedicated Nintendo devices
– The systems will all connect somehow through Nintendo’s new membership program
– Iwata hinted at some interactivity between dedicated Nintendo consoles and smart phones
– Iwata said many mobile companies were “knocking on Nintendo’s door” and offered similar deals
– DeNA was chosen because the company had a “passion” to work with Nintendo that impressed Nintendo
– Iwata: “DeNA attacked Nintendo with a passion, so we were impressed by them.”

If you watched Nintendo and DeNA’s presentation earlier this week, then most of this should just be rehash. Nintendo will also be putting up an English transcript soon enough I’m sure, so hopefully you’ll be able to read the full Q&A in the near future.

GamesIndustry has collected a bunch of quotes from various mobile developers, who have responded to this week’s news regarding Nintendo and DeNA’s partnership. The two companies will be working together to bring games to smart devices. You can find all of the comments rounded up below.

Kristian Segerstrale, COO, Super Evil Megacorp: “It’s great to see that more core game developers are taking mass market touch screens seriously as a primary gaming device. We’re all huge Nintendo fans and would love to see them do well on mobile! Having more AAA game developers enter the market is beneficial for both players and the industry as it raises the standards for quality. Nintendo has a huge opportunity to broaden their fan base, and also an enormous challenge in ensuring that their brand and in-game experience translates to mobile and tablets.”

Teemu Maki Patola, COO of Frogmind: “Nintendo has a lot of strong IPs that are likely to fit mobile gaming well. It also knows how to make good game design. And apparently has realised that strategically it needs to be involved in mobile gaming. DeNA has a lot of experience in making successful products on mobile and knows how to make well performing F2P games. It has a lot of data of analytics, F2P business intelligence etc. I think the partnership can save a few years of Nintendo’s time. This way Nintendo is not required to go through the F2P learning curve (in which it has been completely uninvolved) but can skip ahead relying on DeNA’s knowledge on the areas it lacks. To really work, the co-operation needs deep strategic partnership which they set with the ritual of buying each other’s stock making the success of the other a mutual interest for both.”